• The associations are less obvious for state capacity, but in general poorer states are less likely to see sustained peaceful protest
• Importantly, democracy and capacity tend to covary, so its harder to find “high capacity autocracies”

• Examples: Contemporary U.S., France, Germany etc.

• Explicit or implicit legal protections for protest

• Mechanisms for peaceful transitions or change in policy

• Ability to effectively repress transgressive contention and reward compliance

• Examples: Jamaica, Tunisia, Ukraine, Brazil*
  • States can’t always effectively use repression, but may fear public opinion.
  • High levels of activity, including some violence, but with concessions from the state

• Examples: Yemen, Burma

  • States may lack the capacity to repress effectively, but also they don’t offer concessions

  • Protests often evolve into civil war and revolutions

• Examples: China, Hungary*, Iran

  • There’s an (imperfect) correlation between state capacity and democracy, so these are comparatively more rare

  • Contention happens, but it rarely threatens (and sometimes strengthens) the state.

…the actual or threatened use of physical sanctions against an individual or organization, within the territorial jurisdiction of the state, for the purpose of imposing a cost on the target as well as deterring specific activities and/or beliefs perceived to be challenging to government personnel, practices or institutions

- Davenport, Christian. “State repression and political order.” Annu. Rev. Polit. Sci. 10.1 (2007): 1-23.

• Excludes more common “law enforcement” activities that don’t involve expressive activity

• Excludes subtle (and sometimes deliberate) structural inequalities that can reduce protests, as well as positive incentives that could undermine protest (co-option)

• Emphasizes “first amendment type rights” like freedom of speech, association, press etc.

• All states use repression in response to threats! Democracies repress less (although there’s some debate about the shape of this relationship)

• But they vary in terms of their willingness, ability to use it, the actions/groups they repress due to both state capacity and leader characteristics

“I no longer wanted to fight. At whom was I going to fire? At children and youths who did not completely realize what they were doing?” - Maximiliano Hernández Martínez (president of El Salvador from 1935 - 1944)

Quoted in: Brockett, Charles D.. Political Movements and Violence in Central America (Cambridge Studies in Contentious Politics) (p. 199). Cambridge University Press.

For leaders

• Costs: loss of legitimacy, backlash, disruption

• Constraints: inability to target protesters effectively, lack of competent/loyal police or military

• Alternatives: co-opting protests or granting concessions

For protesters

• How likely/how severe is the punishment? How important is my contribution?

• Can I avoid consequences by staying home? Are there less dangerous alternatives to open dissent?

• January 1978 op-ed condemning Khomeini. Students/Clergy protests and the state uses live ammunition to disperse the crowd.

• February 1978: protests break out in multiple cities during memorial services (pattern of protests every 40 days ensues)

• February - August, 1978: Shah makes multiple concessions to protest leaders

• August 19, 1979: Cinema Rex fire kills 400, revolutionaries blame the Shah

• September 4, 1978: hundreds of thousands march through Tehran during Eid al-Fitr.

• September 8, 1978: Shah declares martial law, and soldiers kill 64 protesters who remain in the streets after curfew.

• Nationwide strikes and protests through the remainder of the year. Shah flees in January 1979